Looking for Zapata

Emiliano Zapata was a popular hero of the 1910 Mexican Revolution: countrymen saw “Robin Hood,” the government called him a “bandit.” He was born 1879 in the village of Anenecuilco, near Cuautla, in a dwelling now enshrined. There is a museum. His father labored on an hacienda, but Emiliano learned to read and write and was a natural horseman. It was enough for leadership. Anenecuilco is a 45-minute drive. Zapata’s general headquarters in Tlaltizapan is a museum about a 40-minute drive south of Anenecuilco with photographs, writings, his bedroom and the clothes he purportedly wore when he was assassinated. In 17th Century former Convent of San Miguel Arcangel is a mausoleum Zapata ordered for his fallen comrades. At Hacienda San Juan Chinameca, an hour’s drive southeast of Cuernavaca near Tepalcingo, Zapata was lured to an ambush in 1919 and shot dead by Mexican Army troops. Bullet marks are visible at the entrance. An heroic sculpture of Zapata marks the spot, and there is a small museum. Zapata’s body was displayed in Cuautla, but farmers in his home state of Morelos still see him sometimes riding his white horse through the hills.